Gay As a Canary

A canary caged within the trap of metal mounted in decor, Is but a song that’s heard by those unafraid of floors. A canary kept in the thicket in what we pretend of nature, Is but a break for beaks in walled-in nomenclature. Throw the thicket in the metal and melt the two in one, Into a song sung twice between a broken chance of bone. A canary freed from cages hung before its wicked glimpse, Is but a baffled bird before a reckoning of practiced wince. And a canary led into a cave is but a beckoning of its call, To warn that which of circumstance that signals fear to fall. First the fear to fall has felt a need for wired cage, The fear of freedom which feigns a fall by others’ rage. Second the safety of open airs seems harmless in its wake, Yet pins protrude from plains in sights despite its own fake sake. The third pretends a chance to break from bonds ensured before, A slave’s own shackles broken by the lies whose fingers swore. The fourth is but a folly most known by donkey’s who belong, To those who know the lengths of which to understand King Kong. To be a gay man is one through four, and my message should have shown, Fear, freedom, safety, and acceptance are all fallacies we’ve all known. I’m sorry but I won’t pretend to feel free in a cage that we’ve intended, Or feel warm within a bubbling broth of brotherhood we’ve invented. For I’ve been a canary trapped in a cage or led into a cave, That I’ve invented in my mind as has the transition to a slave. Cages and caves are but a glimpse of what we must see as clues, To feel towards those who imagine them, as canaries, and say “F” “U”. 4/12/19